"If providers utilize their IT to its fullest potential through an EHR, then they're going to be able to maximize their Medicare reimbursement in 2019," says Carrie Gulledge, director of EHR with MediSYS.

On September 8th, Medicare announced two more ways to participate in the upcoming shift to the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA). "There are four different payment programs now, since the release of the pick-you-pace model," says Carrie Gulledge, RHIA, director of EHR with MediSys. "They allow providers to test the waters with their toe or jump all in."

"Patient Portals are continuing to evolve, like all medical software," says Jimmy Chapman, president of MedConnect, which makes the EHR distributed by MediSYS in Alabama. "Portals will change communication between physicians and patients."

More tools are rolling out to help with the onerous transition to ICD-10 codes due to start on October 1. “You have options,” says Tammie R. Olson, CPC, CPCO, a certified professional coder with Management Resource Group (MRG).

“I don’t know that sales people are really mentioning this problem upfront,” says Ryan McGinty with Oceris, makers of FlexMedical electronic health record (EHR) system. “But each time a practice transitions to a new EHR, a complete data conversion is almost never possible.”

With just two Medicare exam codes, a physician raised her revenue by $45,320. “So many services that patients are eligible for, like preventative care visits, don’t get utilized by providers, and many are already performing the services,” says Julie Thompson, billing supervisor at MediSYS.